Dear Mark,
I've always felt that
being in the stock market is the same as playing blackjack. They're both
gambling. I might as well do something I love instead of giving some
investment company my money to flush down the toilet. You're in
gambling, do you agree? Ralph G.
Your analysis of comparing the stock
market to blackjack is way off the mark. Entering the world of blackjack
as a profession (investment) takes enormous work and you're playing
against, if not for a better term, a financial institution that not only
has a built-in house edge but is there exclusively to beat you. Come on,
Ralph. How many people do you know who win at blackjack — consistently?
Compare that to what a market like NASDAQ has done over the past 10
years. Gone up, up, up! Give me a dart board and the Wall Street
Journal and I would have averaged 12% over the past 30 years.
I'm sure your next argument will be that
of becoming a sophisticated card counter. Sorry, it's not worth spending
hours in smoke-filled casinos, performing tedious mental calculations
and disguising your play so you won't be thrown out, just for a 1% edge.
Finally, Dr. Edward Thorp, who wrote the
classic Beat the Dealer was, as a professional, in the investment
business. Even he conceded it is far easier to make money in the
financial markets than at blackjack. Unfortunately, gambling is a poor
man's way of investing, and even for the poorest of investors, a $500
wager in a mutual fund is a much better bet.
Dear Mark,
When the state lotto
gets over $20 million here in California, my mother wants me to buy $10
worth of lottery tickets and then mail them back to her in Michigan. Is
it legal for me to mail her the tickets? Roberta G.
Congratulate your mother for me, Roberta,
for waiting till the lottery reaches $20 million before she purchases
her tickets. Because the true odds of hitting the California lottery are
18,009,460 to 1, she's actually playing the game smart.
As for the legality of sending tickets
through the mail, sorry, Roberta, using the United States Postal Service
for this particular ruse is against the law. Millions do it,
unknowingly, but I have yet to hear of one individual who has been
charged, or convicted for sending lottery tickets by mail — NOT ONE! But
if you want to play it straight, it's perfectly legal to use a service
like Federal Express or Airborne Express.
Where individuals and
businesses have gotten into trouble is soliciting you to play a foreign
lottery. Ever get one of those plain white envelopes enticing you to
play the Canadian Lottery, Roberta? Don't! It's against the law, again
for the same reason. U.S. postal regulations state that using the U.S.
mail to solicit people to play the lottery, or even to distribute any
type of lottery material, is strictly illegal.
By the way, there's a
reason why their envelope on the outside doesn't give away what's on the
inside. With a Canadian Lotto return address, it would be confiscated by
the USPS before it reached you.
Dear Mark,
On a recent trip to
Branson, Missouri, I stopped along the way in Kansas City and gambled
for the first time. I was surprised to see both loss limits and two-hour
cruises. Is that common? Bill K.
The loss limits and cruise times are in
place to prevent problem gamblers from spending more than they can
afford to lose. Currently Missouri is the only state with these
restrictions. It is the wisdom of the Missouri legislature that by
setting limits you won't blow your trip bankroll, you will have time to
get religion and still have enough money to see Wayne Newton in Branson.
